Best high-end p67 mobo?

Sida

Sida

Sida

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I'm going to be getting a new motherboard and I can't decide which to get. The choices are:

MSI Big Bang Marshal
Asus ROG Maximus IV
Gigabyte P67A-UD7

I'll also be getting an AMD 6990 overclocked, Corsair AX1200, Intel 2500k @ hopefully around 4.8GHz and the gpu and cpu will be under water (maybe mobo in the future).

One question I do have is about the Asus and Gigabyte boards. They are both equipped for 3-way SLI/Crossfire. With the 6990 being dual gpu, does that mean I won't be able to put another 6990 on the board in the future? Or is it referring to the fact that you can only fit 3 cards on the board and could essentially have 3 6990s on there (not that I will ever have 3 of them)?

Out of the 3 boards, I prefer the looks of the maximus. However, the GPU spacing and upgradability on the marshal is great. I think I'd like to go for the maximus but am worried about the question above. Also for the price of these boards I could go X58 and get an Asus Rampage III Extreme which is a godly board, but seeing as I'm buying everything and not just upgrading from x58 I'll be better off going for P67 right?

Thanks guys
 
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Seems a slight side step changing from a Overclocked i7 950 to a Sandy Bridge setup, what's wrong with your current board?

You will be able to run another 6990 to give quad Crossfire.
 
Situation has led me to be purchasing a new setup as my current one is going elsewhere :)
 
Sida said:
I'm going to be getting a new motherboard and I can't decide which to get. The choices are:

MSI Big Bang Marshal
Asus ROG Maximus IV
Gigabyte P67A-UD7

I'll also be getting an AMD 6990 overclocked, Corsair AX1200, Intel 2500k @ hopefully around 4.8GHz and the gpu and cpu will be under water (maybe mobo in the future).

One question I do have is about the Asus and Gigabyte boards. They are both equipped for 3-way SLI/Crossfire. With the 6990 being dual gpu, does that mean I won't be able to put another 6990 on the board in the future? Or is it referring to the fact that you can only fit 3 cards on the board and could essentially have 3 6990s on there (not that I will ever have 3 of them)?

Out of the 3 boards, I prefer the looks of the maximus. However, the GPU spacing and upgradability on the marshal is great. I think I'd like to go for the maximus but am worried about the question above. Also for the price of these boards I could go X58 and get an Asus Rampage III Extreme which is a godly board, but seeing as I'm buying everything and not just upgrading from x58 I'll be better off going for P67 right?

Thanks guys
Click to expand...

Maybe wait for the Z68 boards that are about to drop in the next few weeks. P67 boards are limited to two x8 PCI-E lanes so aren't really equipped for 3-way SLI/CF.
 
daveash said:
Maybe wait for the Z68 boards that are about to drop in the next few weeks. P67 boards are limited to two x8 PCI-E lanes so aren't really equipped for 3-way SLI/CF.
Click to expand...

The Z68 boards will also only have 16 PCI-E lanes so they're no improvement on P67 in that respect.

Some high end P67 boards have Nvidia NF200 chips to provide more than 16 PCI-E lanes. No doubt some high end Z68 boards will have these as well.
 
Surveyor said:
The Z68 boards will also only have 16 PCI-E lanes so they're no improvement on P67 in that respect.

Some high end P67 boards have Nvidia NF200 chips to provide more than 16 PCI-E lanes. No doubt some high end Z68 boards will have these as well.
Click to expand...

I bow to your superior knowledge.
 
The UD7 has the NF200 chip but slot layout mean that in sli/xfire the cards are close together but its not proving to be a problem on mine with 6950s running.

Top card runs about 10-13c hotter than lower card but still acceptable temps.

Runs both at 16x due to NF200 chip but not sure what real world difference it makes.

You could run sli/xfire with a card in top slot and the other in lower but havent tried that yet myself as need a longer xfire bridge.
 
The cards will be watercooled anyway. I'm going to be running the single 6990 for now and when I eventually get another I'll put that under water too. Apparently the difference between 8x and 16x only really shows at high resolutions but I'll be using eyefinity. My main concern was whether the boards can only have trifire or whether it means 3 physical cards. It's the latter then?
 
If the board can do crossfire it will do crossfire/trifire/quadfire (not sure if those names are correct)
Because each setup only requires 2 cards.
 
Sida said:
The cards will be watercooled anyway. I'm going to be running the single 6990 for now and when I eventually get another I'll put that under water too. Apparently the difference between 8x and 16x only really shows at high resolutions but I'll be using eyefinity. My main concern was whether the boards can only have trifire or whether it means 3 physical cards. It's the latter then?
Click to expand...

Trifire can be I believe different variations, ie 3 single cards or a 6990 which has 2 gpu's on one card and a single gpu card like the 69xx range which makes trifire.
 
quite possibley Nvidiot.

Basic gist being that if a motherboard can run 2 graphics cards in crossfire it will run:
2 graphics cards in trifrie (6990 + 6970 / 5970 + 5870)
and
2 graphics cards in quadfire (6990 + 6900 / 5970 + 5970)

I've never seen a 3 card ati setup before.
 
R088ieS86 said:
I've never seen a 3 card ati setup before.
Click to expand...

3x5770's in Trifire:

4981025898_b69b05942e_b.jpg


3x4890's in Trifire:

dscn3865.jpg


3x5850's in Trifire:

Tri%20Fire%205850.jpg
 
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